When identifying their roles, educators highlighted the importance of empowering their colleagues. As educators were often provided with little training on this topic, this often meant that they needed to empower themselves and then empower others. Participants identified that they empowered educators through team building, professional development, and conversations. These educators were then empowered enough to confront others, seek resources, share
opportunities, and create trust for their students. This became particularly vital in order to connect students with as many resources as possible.
However, educators often described this process as time consuming and impeding of their other responsibilities. It was with this in mind that educators noted the importance of empowering their colleagues to do the same and share their workload by educating themselves or seeking resources for this particular group. Despite the varied political contexts, educators across New York and Arizona noted that when educators empowered themselves to seek resources
undocumented students would feel more comfortable outing themselves and seeking resources and opportunities. As previous studies have noted established trust in a necessary step for educators working with undocumented students (Malagon, 2006).
Educators’ experience receiving little to no training on undocumented students motivated their self-empowerment. A lack of formal training impacted educators’ confidence to make decisions or give advice because they lacked the knowledge needed to provide support. Kelly pointed out that her feelings of discomfort came from feeling unprepared by her master’s program. At the start of her career she began to connect with students and as she developed a sense of trust with them, they began to share with her their status. However, she received no preparation, no literature, and no training on this group of students and their needs. Kelly reiterated the importance of including these aspects in her teacher training program.
I think in some respects, at the Collegiate level, they should be saying things within a teacher preparation that talks about these issues and helps you prepare for them... I think it’s critical. That I don’t work to get those kinds of things included in the training process. And helping to educate us so that we’re better prepared. So, when they ask us to first meet with them, to sit down and help, students who may be undocumented, we can say not only are you in a safe space, but we are educated for your educated on this issue (Interview, March 17th).
Kelly’s frustrations came from a place of care and empathy for her students. She mentioned that her school counseling program provided her with socio-emotional support for so many other topics accept this one.
As a first-year school counselor, the school counseling program prepared you in-depth for social emotional counseling, but they don't do much to prepare you for post High School transitions, so school counselors have to learn on their own (Interview, March 17th).
Kelly described that her path towards empowerment was forced on her when her training program did not provide her with the proper tools. This became particularly apparent when a student approached her about college. Kelly described what became all the more jarring was that she was not trained on this in the state of Arizona, a state that has the 4th largest undocumented population and a state which borders Mexico.
The school counseling program that I graduated from never discussed those type of issues and I graduated from a program here in Arizona. That to me that was really unexpected the fact that we and I'm sure it's just as bad in other places, but the amount of
undocumented student here, here in Arizona. We are in a position to be upfront, preparing me for is part of that (Interview, March 17th).
Kelly’s point was well heard in this study. Arizona is a state that could be a leader in
undocumented student support, but she found that her programs had not helped to inform her or her school districts. However, just because Arizona borders Mexico it should be the only state prepared to support undocumented students. Florida, New York, and New Jersey are other states that do not meet the Mexican border and have some of the largest undocumented populations. Indeed New York educators felt very similarly about the lack of teacher preparation for educators working with undocumented students. Anthony a teacher in New York explained that he was not trained to fully support undocumented students, and educators today are still not being prepared. So, in that part of my career I thought, and we’ve found is still true, is that teachers were the ones who supported kids with those kinds of conversations and even though we weren't trained to do that at all, but I just couldn't really think of another way (Interview, March 21st).
Anthony maked another important point that it has to be educators that are trained on this topic because they are often the ones who are in direct contact with students and their families. As education programs failed educators in their preparation to support undocumented students, it often took empowered educators to train their colleagues.
Judy, a teacher in New York highlighted the importance of educators being ready for any moment in which students may share their status. Throughout their interviews many educators described moments in which students shared their status with them. It was often in moments of
crisis or when they needed immediate support. Rarely was it when students were prepared to talk about it or when there was still plenty of time to address their concerns.
I have students who are undocumented, and their status usually comes up through individual conversations where they disclose their status to me for whatever reason will be talking about jobs will be talking about college will be talking about paying for something or some crisis, they’re going through something that's happening to a family member (Interview, March 2nd).
It was particularly important for new educators to be involved and informed about undocumented student’s experiences. This was in part because they were not prepared by their programs to address these concerns. However, educators also noted that when they first began their work students were not quick to trust them because they were new. Many of the newer educators shared that it took time for students to reach out to them for support even when they needed immediate resources. Angie, a teacher in New York, worked with an educator who was well versed and prepared to work with undocumented students. She sought out her support for this reason, however Angie began to notice that students were not ready to trust because they identified that she was not well informed.
I found that most of the students that were in the club had been here for at least a year if not more, and they were definitely more open to speaking with her and sharing their personal narratives which I had to work towards gaining their trust a little bit. I don’t think I knew them enough, so it was a little bit of a challenge connecting with them talking with them but once we got past that we were able to develop relationships (Interview, June 18th).
Angie knew the importance of empowering herself to develop knowledge and relationships with students in order to fully provide them with support.
Self-Empowerment & Empowering Others
As educators expanded on their role by illustrating how they first empowered themselves to seek resources and advocate for students. When asked about their roles and the ways in which they empowered themselves to seek resources, many educators referred to moments when they first began working with undocumented students. Kelly, a teacher in Arizona remembered when she was confronted by a student trying to understand his status and how it impacted his education. This student meeting was the first time a student had outed themselves as undocumented to her.
She recounts the event as the moment when she began to acknowledge a gap in her knowledge and when she decided she needed to be informed about this experience.
He came to me for help and I wasn't prepared to help him and that's what pushed me into going to meetings to get training and to learn how that can help (Interview, March 17th).
However, Kelly also acknowledged that her schooling and her training had not prepared her for this, and it may require more than just additional educational experience but a real support system.
I had all the job training from my school. But given some of the issues that we deal with on a regular basis, to help prepare you versus not helping me until I'm confronted with the first student and not knowing how to help them. I felt it was a disservice to that student who had many points of contact prior to me (Interview, March 17th).
Kelly’s experience with a student forced her to confront her lack of knowledge and acknowledge her role as an educator that needed to serve all of her students. Therefore, she empowered herself to seek out spaces that were informed and educators that could support her. Kelly’s process reflects how organizational actors generate new norms within schools in an effort to define responsibility and action (Bernhardt et al, 2016). It was often with other educators that the participants began to feel empowered to not only provide support but seek other information. Robert, a vice principal in Arizona described a similar experience of not fleeing trained or prepared to support undocumented students, however after joining a group of educators he began to understand his role and the answers he could provide.
We didn’t know, before this group, what was recommend we know now that if our students, that we can we cannot give legal advice…we have a group that has allowed us to find resources that we can get to their families if we have questions we can refer them to where they can answer those questions…we did not feel comfortable before
(Interview, March 1st).
Robert explained that before working with other educators he did not feel empowered to shar resources and information because he did not feel informed. Other educators expressed similar sentiments showcasing that other educators helped to empower them to share resources and information to undocumented students, even if that meant simply reassuring students. In the
example provided above by Kelly, she reflected that her role became to reassure students when they needed resources that she was not prepared to provide.
So, she came to me, but I didn't really know how it worked. I just knew that she should be able to get it and so then because of that network of people I had gotten to know and I was able to reach out but it was one of those things where I have to work with her in the process because she got very nervous and I said, well look I know you're entitled but we need to figure out exactly how (Interview, March 17th).
Methods towards Empowering Others
As educators explained their developed sense of empowerment, they explained how their lens shifted to also encourage other educators to empower themselves in an effort to support students. Kelly, the teacher in Arizona described the benefit of attending trainings that informed her teaching. She explained to her colleagues why this was crucial for their students.
I have been trying to encourage other counselors to participate, become educated, get involved with those processes through organizations (Interview, March 17th).
In other schools’ educators shared that they were able to organize larger training sessions for a variety of educators across the city. Judy a New York teacher explained the training she put on for her school.
My second year teaching at the school we did a professional development session for teachers on supporting undocumented youth and both myself and my other current facilitator of the dream team at the time (Interview, March 2nd).
Educators in Arizona also vocalized the importance of these trainings to higher admin. Julia, a higher up admin in Arizona shared that she would often prioritize trainings for educators on this topic in an effort to prepare them for the work they will face. In particular Julia made a point of highlighting that these trainings would benefit students in different places, whether
undocumented or simply non-resident. She would often leverage her role in order to strongly encourage educators to attend.
I'm trying to make sure that are school counselors and other individuals were interested or able to participate in professional learning regarding the needs of non-resident students across the board and that might be immigrant students from many, many different places as well as are DACA and a documented students so professional learning is very
While Julia highlighted the breath of experiences educators need to be familiar with, educators highlighted the importance of empowering others through collaboration in order to share the load of these cases.
Similarly, educators in New York also involved their administrative staff to create opportunities of empowerment. Ruth, a teacher in New York, described how her principal helped to organize a training for educators across the city in order to better inform them about supporting undocumented students.
All these principles, my principal got her principal friends together, it was really
beautiful… and we presented our workshop and we did a workshop all about organizing dream teams and the history and the relationship between the two groups, ways to support students in schools, and that was like a one and a half hour to two hour workshop that maybe 30 or so teachers, educators, principals, counselors came to ours (Interview, April 5th).
Empowerment through educator teams and collaboration allowed staff to reach out to other educators at multiple levels. Gabriela, an office manager in Arizona worked primarily with undocumented students before a new colleague arrived at her campus. She noticed she wanted to support undocumented students as well and reached out to her to provide additional information and support.
I asked how can I help you. I think she also identified the needs of undocumented students and their families. And so, I went to I talk about how we try to help them still “under the water” you know because our administration still did not support them at all (Interview, March 9th).
Similar practices included new educators in New York. Leo explained that it was meaningful to get the new staff acquainted with the support systems they created for undocumented students.
We do Professional Development for them. We always have an immigration section where we would try to keep them up to date, the new teachers that may not be very aware of how things go down in real life, what kind of things our families are going to
encounter (Interview, July 11th).
Kelly described her experience with the group of educators and the trainings she attended to supplement her knowledge. While the group did not conduct the trainings, they connected her
resources and support. She explained the importance of attending trainings even when they were hosted far away from the campus and her home. These trainings often led her to attend others hosted across the city and help schools connect with one another.
I would go to training sessions that they gave the school counselors and schoolteachers. So, they had organized training and information sessions that they provided at various locations...I remember one which I attended was hosted at a church on the other side of town and I know they kind of went and had it at a hotel. We’ve put on different things in the schools and then the organization...was trying to help the high schools to get them to talk to each other (Interview, March 17th).
The multitude of resources Kelly was able to connect to through trainings made her feel a sense of empowerment. Much like Robert this empowerment allowed her to be more self-assured about the advice and support she could provide students because she had the information available. Kelly continued by explaining how this ultimately supported her students.
Not only was it empowering for me, it was all so empowering because I had that information for students who may or may not have known that those faces, and places and people are there to support them in a community of students you know who can share that information such a risk (Interview, March 17th).
Leo, a manager in a high school in New York is considered the point person for immigrant and undocumented students. He pointed out that he often sat down with educators and provided them with step by step guidance on what they needed to know in order to fully support their students. Leo talked about educators that would approach him at the end of the day to ask about their student’s and what they were experiencing.
She came up to me at the end of the day and said “do you have any support for him” I said yeah...and I’m like okay well let’s sit down and talk about that. I broke it down bit by bit, anyways this happens a lot you’d be surprised how little people know (Interview, July 11th).
Leo’s experience was that his school was more immigrant-friendly than most. His school specialized in transitioning recently-arrived students. Educators apply to this school with those practices in mind. However, they very much relied on him for additional resources.
Everybody has an extra ear towards this topic and the teachers, of course. A lot of the times they are the first responders the ones that hear it, that see it….if they can consult themselves they will do it if you need some legal help or a referral they tell them to lean
on me but yeah in our school luckily it's a very particular school that's why I'm here the staff is pretty woke (Interview, July 11th).
However, Leo explained that it was important to continue to empower other educators in order to support capacity building. He not only managed recent arrivals but connects students with